1and1.com provides an economical shared hosting package. And with features such as php libraries built with the imap-c libraries, a generous daily smtp relay limit, php5 and mysql support, it felt like the ideal place for me to host a SugarCRM instance.

However, receiving several errors after the install was complete made me think that perhaps I should have done more research before shelling out the money for a new hosting provider.

Then I remembered Google…

After a bit of searching I found what I needed to know in order to get SugarCRM running on 1and1 shared hosting.

1) Permissions

Certain SugarCRM directories and files are required to be owned by the same group that owns the Apache web server. If this is not the case, you will many errors at the header of the sugar pages once per session:

Warning: chmod() [function.chmod]: Permission denied in /htdocs/sugardir/include/utils/sugar_file_utils.php on line 194

Specified directory ” for zip file ‘cache/upload/langpack_ge_52a_ce.zip’ extraction does not exist. the CHMOD errors in line 196.

Changing ownership of SugarCRM directories\files to this group is only possible with root access. And on a shared host such as 1and1, you will not have root access.

The document here describes what to do if you are using Sugar on a shared host. This did not work for me. And yes, I know it is not secure.

A bit more digging around turned up this post. It describes a line in config.php that attempts to set a directory to mode 1528. The author simply changed this mode to 1520. I tried it. It worked!

array (
‘dir_mode’ => 1528, <——- Change the 1520 to 1528
‘file_mode’ => 432,
‘user’ => ”,
‘group’ => ”,
),

2) Zlib compression

After the permissions problems were resolved, I received a new set of errors:

PHP … Cannot change zlib.output_compression – headers already sent …

Again a quick search on google turned up the answer. Create a php.ini file in the hosting root directory with the following line: zlib.output_compression = On.

Now all is well with SugarCRM on 1and1

This guest post is by Kelvin Johnson, an applications Developer from Blue Island, Illinois, USA

I recently moved my other website from 1and1 Linux shared hosting to 1and1 VPSII Linux hosting package (plesk). While trying to install SugarCRM on VPSII the system check of SugarCRM installer doesn’t let me through; gives an error message at the beginning of the installation process. “The session.save_path setting in your php configuration file (php.ini) is not set or is set to a folder which did not exist. You might need to set the save_path setting in php.ini or verify that the folder sets in save_path exist”.

After hours of digging the internet for the problem, checking and rechecking everything: the solution to the error is quite simple. There is a IF LOOP syntax error in the install/installSystemCheck.php file! All you need to do is add curly braces at line number 186 after:

if (strpos ($session_save_path, “;”) !== FALSE){
and close the braces at line number 210: }}

Follow the steps below to edit the installSystemCheck.php file:
Step1: FTP access you SugarCRM folder using a FTP client (I use FileZilla).

Step2: Browse to the install folder within the SugarCRM folder.

Step3: Download installSystemCheck.php file to you local hard drive.

Step4: Open installSystemCheck.php using a text editor (I use EditPadPro).

Step5: Scroll to line number 186 and add curly braces after: if (strpos ($session_save_path, “;”) !== FALSE){

Step6: Scroll further to line number 210 and close the curly braces. See the complete code below. Braces to be added are in red.

if (strpos ($session_save_path, “;”) !== FALSE){
$session_save_path = substr ($session_save_path, strpos ($session_save_path, “;”)+1);
if(is_dir($session_save_path)){
if(is_writable($session_save_path)){
installLog(”Session Save Path is “.$session_save_path);
}else{
$save_pathStatus = “{$mod_strings['ERR_CHECKSYS_SESSION_SAVE_PATH_NOT_WRITABLE']}“;
installLog(”ERROR:: {$mod_strings['ERR_CHECKSYS_SESSION_SAVE_PATH_NOT_WRITABLE']}”);
$error_found = true;
$error_txt .= ‘

‘.$mod_strings['LBL_CHECKSYS_SESSION_SAVE_PATH'].’
‘.$save_pathStatus.’
‘;
}
}else{
$save_pathStatus = “{$mod_strings['ERR_CHECKSYS_SESSION_SAVE_PATH_NOT_SET']}“;
installLog(”ERROR:: {$mod_strings['ERR_CHECKSYS_SESSION_SAVE_PATH_NOT_SET']}”);
$error_found = true;
$error_txt .= ‘

‘.$mod_strings['LBL_CHECKSYS_SESSION_SAVE_PATH'].’
‘.$save_pathStatus.’
‘;
}}

Step7: Save the file and upload back to the remote SugarCRM install folder, replacing the original file.

Step8: Run the SugarCRM installer again, should run fine now! Note: Make sure the session path is making sense. E.g. the path exists etc.

After installing SugarCRM email ids have to be configured for sending and receiving emails. Which can be a painful task if you don’t know the SMTP and POP3 servers of your host.

All the hosts provide the SMTP and pop3 server configurations which can be used to configure the email ids in the SugarCRM. I installed SugarCRM on 1and1.com shared hosting; there pop3 server works perfectly fine but for sending out the emails the SMTP server doesn’t work for some reason. Sendmail option can be used instead of SMTP but when you send emails using sendmail are marked as spam.

After researching for the problem I found out the solution. IP address of the SMTP server (74.208.5.2) must be used that means put 74.208.5.2 instead of smtp.1and1.com in the SMTP server configuration and it will work fine.

But now they can! thanks to SugarCRM – The open source customer relationship management (CRM) system. SugarCRM can be downloaded from HERE. It’s easy to install and configure all the documentation for using as well as for installing is available at HERE. It can be installed on a stand alone PC (using the stack installers) as well as on the webserver by downloading the appropriate installation package.

SugarCRM is one of the most popular Open Source CRM software systems. As per the SugarCRM community they have hit an exciting milestone on SugarForge.org. Over 5 million downloads across all 550+ projects! It is the most mature and arguably the easiest to use CRM product available. Most of all its free to use with almost all the required features from importing contacts to running reports.

It also gives you the option to customize the available fields, layouts etc. Even the available tab names can be customized according to ones needs. All this can be done inside the administration panel; users and administrators can be defined and managed. The ability to customize the system to such an extent without having to look into the code makes SugarCRM very powerful and adaptable.

SugarCRM Open Source is an excellent choice for any small or medium sized business that is considering implementing a CRM system. Businesses with little to no experience with CRM systems will find it an excellent choice among open source CRM’s available.